The biggest test for me right now, I think a lot of people have heard about it, is the death of my son and my brother. This has done something to me that I've never felt in my life. Never, ever been through this challenge.
And what I mean by challenge is the feelings and the thought process and the amount of... Reflection on life like now really, really makes you understand the word إِنَّا لِلَّهُ وَإِنَّا لَيْهِ رَاجِعُونَ Suddenly nothing around you is worth stressing too much about. You know, spending too much time about everything around you now, you look at a way of how to turn it into something beneficial for others, for yourself and for the hereafter.
And money didn't mean much after that. My brother was, it's the first time I talk now about Hamza. I can hint a bit of detail.
He had a business growing for him. I think he was going to become a millionaire in a couple of years. So successful, and only because of his character, people loved him. He's really out there and beautiful to get along with. He's a very honest person.
And my son, you know, he died in front of me. I was giving him CPR, and he was very peaceful. I thank Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.
This word thanks has more of a meaning right now. Thank you, O Allah, for the past that you gave me. Thank you, O Allah, for the past that you prevented from me, the bad things. Thank you, Allah, for giving my son and my brother and teaching me love and now connecting me to something else.
Thank you, O Allah, for the future that you will give me and the things that you are going to keep away from me in the future because I know that you know that will help me. Thank you, Allah. You've given me my son and taken him for a reason and a purpose that you only know within your wisdom, and I rely on you.
It has increased my iman, of course, and the people around us. Akhi Abu Hamza, two moments in my life, I think, I dream about them all the time now. And I don't think there's anything that's more important than them. The moment my son's soul escaped my brother's, and the moment I buried them.
It's like death had no respect for me. Who cares if you're his father, who are you? This is not your business. This is not your business, how I felt.
Don't you see I'm here? He's dad. It doesn't belong to you, Bida.
It belongs to Allah. And if you do trust in Allah, now's the time for you to prove it to yourself. Are you going to think about Allah right now? Allah is Arham Ar-Rahim.
Maybe, maybe this was the best time for them to leave. Maybe I stayed for a reason, Allah knows. In the moment that they were buried, I was in the grave and I felt like bashing my head on the walls.
I wanted to die with them. I looked at my son, I said, my hands, how can you put your son in the ground? How dare you?
You're the father. You're supposed to be protecting him. You're supposed to, you know, you promised him things. Promised my son, dad, I'm not always going to be there for you, so I'm going to teach you to stand on your own two feet.
But then I remembered Rasulullah, peace be upon him. And as he was sitting... Standing in the grave with his son And I said the dua And he said what pleases our Lord You know what's funny Abu Hamid What's ironic is that I said the exact words of the Prophet even the name, his son's name was Ibrahim I could imagine Rasulullah ﷺ feeling what I'm feeling right now, crying the way I'm crying I got stronger a little bit then.
I said, Ya Allah, unite us again with Rasool Allah. And I had to walk away, Abu Hamza. You have to walk away. There my brother and son sat there. They just lied there.
They didn't know they were going to die. But before we left here, I just want to finish it with this, something really good. That is that before we left, we went to please Allah. What did we want to please Him with?
We had our parents, we wanted to make them happy. My mother was missing us in Lebanon, my dad. And my brother and I, we talked to them for the last time before we left, and he got teary.
My brother was very, very, he had this softness about him. I looked at my brother and son and I said, Shoo, you want to go in this ugly time? Because there's civil unrest there.
My son had a big smile on his face. He said, for Jadon Taita? I'd do anything Baba.
Can't wait to see them, make them happy. We shook hands and we said, Okay, let's make our intention right now. We're going to please Allah SWT. Because if we die there, inshallah, we die shahada.
Inshallah ya Rabb. We die on the path of Allah. And if we return, we return inshallah ya Rabb.
The huge amount of mountains of rewards. I thought we were going to die in a civil war, in a civil unrest there. Subhanallah, my son and I, we went to UK. That was my last lecture tour overseas with my son.
Ironically, the UK people knew my son and my brother. They didn't know anyone else in my family. Why?
Because a year before it, they paid for my brother to go with me, Muhammad. He went with me on that tour. Mufti Menka called me up that time.
I said, I want to take my brother with me. They said, all right. And then my son, they knew him. When he was a child and when he grew up. And they all, they had a love for him.
All of this, Allah is setting up things. When we got there, SubhanAllah, they died in a place that I never, ever thought. We were just up there on some snowmobile.
Just wanna have fun. He said, my son wants to see Lebanon, he wants to see the snow. He gets up on this thing. It's meant to be safe, I don't know. He goes around once and he's alright.
I come walking towards them or somewhere else and our cousin said to him, no. He goes, you can't go on again by yourself. You have to take your father or your brother or your uncle. Because my brother, he had experience on it.
Knowing my brother Muhammad, subhanAllah, he'd jump and do anything, subhanAllah, for people. And I said... And then they said, either your brother or your uncle or your father. Who does he choose? He chose his uncle.
If he told me, they would have told me, go on with him. I would have gone on with him. To keep him safe.
My brother, he said, I'll go on with him. Allah chose him before your son chose his uncle. You know, they loved each other a lot. يُبَعَثُ الْمَرْءُ مَعَ مَنْ أَحَبُّ A person is gathered with those whom they love.
Took a turn, and that's when I saw them now, they're taking off. My father was there, I was there, my cousins were there, two of them. Just saw it go off very nicely. I had a feeling, a voice in my head told me, they're going to smash into the wall and die. And in that voice went, I could see it.
Hell. And then it went. And I forgot about it. I'm happy and my son's having fun, okay, Allah khalas, but I want him to get off, you know, I'm not happy about it. My heart's not, I'm very uncomfortable, very, very uncomfortable.
Like that voice, and it went. And I see them, it's like as if, you know, the angel of death was waiting there. It's like he had a rope and just pulled them in.
It wouldn't stop. The petrol throttle got stuck. Out of all people.
They just smashed into the wall at a high speed. They couldn't get off. I could see them trying to maneuver.
They couldn't get off. Very hard for me to talk about. But my son passed away at the scene. I ran to him, tried to... Died within four minutes, really.
My brother, he survived it a little bit. About an hour, he went into the ambulance with my son. My brother's telling him, I'm following you, I'm following you, five minutes. In the hospital, he died. Both got buried.
I hugged my brother and son. I said, don't worry, it's just temporary. When the angels come to you, say this.
I don't know why I was saying that, Abu Hamza. I was just saying a lot of things. First thing I said is, إِنَّ لِلَّهُ وَإِنَّ لَهُ I said it quickly, because I knew I wasn't going to hold myself. I was all in.
إِنَّ لِلَّهُ وَإِنَّ لَهُ I looked up at the sky. I said, where are you? The angel said, just give me a minute.
I just want to say goodbye to my son. If their time comes, they will not delay, nor will they come to the hour. That's it. Allah.
And I think well of him, subhanAllah. InshaAllah this is not the last time. I hope inshaAllah my brothers and sisters around the world can make du'a for them. He went to Umrah this year as well.
There are a few masjids here in Melbourne. I prayed the prayer of the absent on them. May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala grant them al-Firdaus. And subhanAllah, it's like a, you know, really a major adversity took place when this happened. We're all in a state of shock.
Knowing how young your son is and your brother, he's the youngest of them. And I grew up with them basically, may Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. Have mercy upon them and give you and your family patience.
How does it feel now that this Ramadan with your son and your younger brother? You know Abu Hamza, before a tragedy happens, when we think about it, it's actually harder thinking about it. When it happens, it's very hard. Rasulullah something comes down. It's called the Ma'iyya of Allah.
Allah gives you support. It doesn't happen before. It happens when it happens.
You fall into that deep pain and then Allah gives you help. Something picks you up. A Sakina comes and picks you up. You're about to fall and something picks you up. That's how you keep.
And Allah shows you things. He doesn't let you go. It gives you beautiful dreams. I've seen three dreams, I believe they're righteous.
I've seen a lot of takhbees, takhbees means like different dreams. I know they're from my subconscious, but three of them, they were clear, they were sure. I can remember every... Allahumma is the first one I saw. He's a week later, teaching about Ramadan, how Allah brings help for Muslims, He brings ma'iyah.
I wasn't eating for a week and then... I wasn't eating. I was losing weight.
I didn't shower for a week. I just couldn't sleep, nothing. Salat, munajat, munajat, calling out to Allah to save me.
I was like, if I didn't have faith and iman, I think you wouldn't see me here. Really. And something called khalwa, isolation with Allah.
That's all I did in Lebanon. I didn't want to see anyone, but Allah kept bringing them to me. Allah brought the whole family to support. My shaykh, people. And the love was amazing.
I can't believe the whole world was talking about it, making a diet for them, praying for them. My son used to say, Baba, when I die, I want a lot of people to pray on me, and I want my grave flat. SubhanAllah.
Because his grandfather, his mother's father, Allah is merciful. May Allah assist his mother in his disease. And their families as well, obviously, they've gone through a lot of pain.
Not just me, but when his grandfather died, he said, Bobo, I want my grave flat and a lot of people to pray on me. And he said to his cousin, imagine we got buried. We died and got buried up in Bat Ayub.
That's exactly where he got buried. But Allah brings you these things. Like I found these out. I remembered them. His cousin would tell me something.
These dreams would come in. One week later, I saw a dream. I used to say, Ya Allah, please show me a sign.
Just give me some comfort. Ya Rabb, comfort. Be kind and compassionate to me, Ya Allah.
And to my parents, I can't do this. I wasn't coming back. I was, yeah, they've shown me something.
I see my dream that time. So I saw my son. Beautiful people come to me and say, you have to eat in the dream. And I said, look, we've got this food. They brought me to this nice restaurant and there was food in front of me.
And they all said, stand aside. Just don't give him some comfort. To me, there was a big chair next to me, beautiful chair, in the dream. And I see my brother, my son walking in. Same clothes he died in, same everything.
He walked to me, he had a partial smile, and he hugged me and I hugged him. I could feel his bones, I could feel his skin, I could feel his clothes, I could hear everything, I could smell him. Like, I didn't, I knew I was, that he was dead, but I didn't know I was dreaming.
Everything was real. And I grabbed him and I said, Baba, where are you? He said... I'm there, I'm there, Bobo, you know I'm there.
And I said, it's like he doesn't want to upset me, but he knows he's gone. And I said, how are they treating you? I want to know, did he go here or there?
I want to know, am I going to see him in general or not? Am I going to go to general? Is he going to be my chauffeur?
What's going to happen to us? He said, they're okay, Bobo, they're okay. They're nice people.
I turned to the people and I said, don't think I'm crazy in the dream. They smiled and said, Brother Bilal, no one here thinks you're crazy. I said, Hammud, is he good, my brother? He's good.
And he sat down on that chair next to me. I woke up. These things, Allah brings them to you.
You pray to Allah at night. Night prayers have been the most sweetest thing. You know, before this, night prayers, sometimes, but this time, Allah, they're sweet.
Khalwa with Allah is sweet. We talk about it, but you don't know until you do it. I can't tell you. You have to do it, you have to want to do it.
First part of the night, last part of the night. Now in Ramadan we've got khalwa. Allah prepared Rasulullah for his mission after what? After a khalwa.
You have to go to cave of Hira. You have to know yourself. This khalwa is so beautiful.
It's the most sincere. Just you and Allah. And honestly, I didn't think about anybody.
I talk, they take it, they don't take it. I'm not worried about anyone. Just Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. I'm pleasing Him. You sit in the middle of the night and Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.
It's the most beautiful thing. And this is why I'm here now talking. Allah assists you, He helps you, He doesn't leave you alone.